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The Universe is immensely varied, the container of all the
Reason-Principles and of infinite and diverse efficacies. In man,
we are told, the eye has its power, and the bones have their
varied powers, and so with each separate part of hand and of
foot; and there is no member or organ without its own definite
function, some separate power of its own- a diversity of which we
can have no notion unless our studies take that direction. What
is true of man must be true of the universe, and much more, since
all this order is but a representation of the higher: it must
contain an untellably wonderful variety of powers, with which, of
course, the bodies moving through the heavens will be most richly
endowed.
We cannot think of the universe as a soulless habitation, however
vast and varied, a thing of materials easily told off, kind by
kind- wood and stone and whatever else there be, all blending
into a kosmos: it must be alert throughout, every member living
by its own life, nothing that can have existence failing to exist
within it.
And here we have the solution of the problem, "How an ensouled
living form can include the soulless": for this account allows
grades of living within the whole, grades to some of which we
deny life only because they are not perceptibly self-moved: in
the truth, all of these have a hidden life; and the thing whose
life is patent to sense is made up of things which do not live to
sense, but, none the less, confer upon their resultant total
wonderful powers towards living. Man would never have reached to
his actual height if the powers by which he acts were the
completely soulless elements of his being; similarly the All
could not have its huge life unless its every member had a life
of its own; this however does not necessarily imply a deliberate
intention; the All has no need of intention to bring about its
acts: it is older than intention, and therefore its powers have
many servitors.
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